Why The Negro Should Not Vote 


OR 


The Fraud of the Fourteenth Amendment 


5* 


G<* S 


By 

Henry Edwin Bolte 



' Copyrighted 1924 
HENRY EDWIN BOLTE 

WASHINGTON, D. C. 


/ 


©Cl A808457 


OCI -2 i 324 



PREFACE 


Having given the subject herein treated much thought and 
study, and feeling duty bound to my fellowmen, I undertake 
to edit this publication for the enlightenment of such persons 
as may read this issue. 

In the years past and at the present, thp; question of the 
status and proper standing of the American frikgro has had and 
has its complexities- I do not hesitate to herein freely express 
my personal convictions on the subject as well as to endeavor 
to review the history of how the roegro gained his citizenship. 
I am strongly and vigorously opposed to the negro having the 
right of citizenship and suffrage, for the reasons hereinafter 
set forth: 

1. Because the $egro is not a fit person to be clothed with 
citizenship. 

2. The jf/egro race multiplies more rapidly than the white. 
Thus it is, if /the white race does not in the very near future 
separate the ,tyegro from his rapidly growing power in the 
government, then it will be that jtfithin a few generations the 
white will be governed by the negro. There will be jiegro 
Senators, Congressmen and Governors, .and a fiegro President. 
As a means of self-preservation the pegro should be defran- 
chised and made incapable of holding public office. 

3. The Jwegro gained his qualifications to hold public office 
and his citizenship illegally, that is to say, the Fourteenth 
amendment to the Constitution was never legally adopted, and 
is in no sense a part of the Constitution. 


3 


SOUTHERN PUBLISHING COMPANY 
Lynchburg, Virginia 


Why The Negro Should Not Vote 

OR 

The Fraud of the Fourteenth Amendment 


Chapter I. 

The Unfitness of the Negro for Citizenship 

The jkjegro, as a race, has never proven itself competent to rule 
itself or even conduct itself in a manner becoming a civilized 
race, and if deported to their homeland they would, within a very 
few generations, become savage and barbarous, and all traits 
of civilization would disappear. 

The j^gro, as a business or a professional man, is a complete 
failure. Two-thirds of our criminals are of the pkgro race, 
millions of dollars are being spent annually throughout the 
United States to prosecute for crimes committed by /i/egroes 
and to pay the expenses of incarceration after conviction. Thus, 
this element of the /rfegro race is a burden to the taxpayers, 
besides the moral reflection on the whole of the nation. Then 
why give such a race an equal footing with white people? 

Chapter II. 

Rapid Growth of Strength 

The gro race multiplies so rapidly that within a few de¬ 
cades the ^gro will outnumber the white and with their zealous¬ 
ness to gain power they will, if allowed to continue as citizens, 
soon overthrow the white predomination and will control our 
government and all offices, even that of the President, will be 


5 



filled by negroes. Perhaps this statement appears absurd, but 
it requires no skilled mathematician to arrive at an answer favor¬ 
ing this conclusion, when the ratio of births of both races is con¬ 
sidered. 

The following is a list of negroes employed by the United 
States Government in 1912, according to statistics gathered by 
Cyrus F. Adams, formerly Assistant Registrar of the Treasury: 

Employed in the White House. 27 

State Department . 26 

Treasury Department . 926 

War Department . 170 

Navy Department . 74 

Post Office Department . 187 

Department of Interior . 593 

Department of Justice . 43 

Department of Agriculture . 164 

Department of Commerce and Labor . 139 

Washington Navy Yard .:. 364 

Government Printing Office . 634 

Interstate Commerce Commission . 41 

United States Senate. 115 

Library of Congress . 46 

Post Office, Washington, D. C. 171 

The Government of the District of Columbia.2,413 

Miscellaneous . 194 

Department Service at Large: 

Department of State _,_ 16 

Treasury Department . 1,082 

War Department .2,342 

Post Office Department .3,599 

Department of Interior . 31 

Department of Agriculture . 102 

Department of Commerce and Labor . 64 

United States Army Officers . 11 

United States Army Enlisted Men .„.4,416 

United States Navy Enlisted Men .1,529 

United States Navy Yards and Stations .2,146 

Miscellaneous . 775 


6 


































Aggregating 22,440, drawing annual salaries of $12,456,760. The 
author here wishes to say with regard to some of the positions 
held by i^egroes hereinbefore enumerated, that thousands of 
these positions are official where the /tegro official has white 
clerks, both male and female, under his authority. In a great 
number of cases a &egro official has white girls for clerks and 
stenographers. 

It appears most fitting that the writer should relate a specific 
case for the reader’s deliberation. 

There was in 1921 a family of poor people who lived in a 
small town in Virginia. The father of the family, a butcher 
by trade, suffered a stroke of paralysis, whidi left him a help¬ 
less invalid. The four children of the family consisted of three 
girls, ages eleven, thirteen and twenty-one, respectively, and one 
son, age nine. The oldest daughter, sacrificing her betrothal, 
surrendered her future happiness to provide for the family, 
came to Washington, took and passed the required Civil Service 
examination to obtain employment in the Government service 
and was assigned to duty as a clerk in the Treasury Depart¬ 
ment, but on the morning of her arrival to her post of duty 
she was alarmed to find that she had been assigned as a clerk 
under a^egro official from whom she must take orders. This 
she hotly resented, but to no avail. She was told to either accept 
this position or return home without assignment, so after sum¬ 
ming up the circumstances and realizing the great needs of her 
family, she accepted the position, without relating the facts to 
her family. This is but one case out of thousands wherein 
poor white people are forced by circumstances to hold positions 
under Itegro officials. 

Among the positions hereinbefore enumerated is one of great 
importance, that of a Judgeship, there is a mgro judge on the 
bench, presiding over white people, in the very capital of the 
nation, Washington, D. C There is also in Washington, D. C., 


7 


a pegro Recorder of Deeds with white employees, besides many 
high official positions throughout the United States which are 
filled by J^fegroes, all of which is deemed to be the ^outcome of the 
efforts of politicians to gain favor with the^^gro voters by 
giving appointments to them. 

I will further add at this point that the lavatories in all 
Government buildings and departments are used in common by 
the white and tyegro. 

With these facts before you, is there not ground sufficient to 
create alarm over the ever-increasing power of the pegro? 


Chapter III. 

How the Negro Became a Citizen 

“A person of African blood and descent is inherently in¬ 
capable of being a citizen of the United States,” 19 Howard, 
page 393, Dred Scott v. Sanford. 

The above quotation is the language of the Supreme Court 
of the United States used in its decision in the Dred Scott case, 
which was before the Supreme Court just before the outbreak 
of the Civil War. Therefore, although liberated from slavery 
by the Thirteenth Amendment, the j^egro was not a citizen of 
the United States after the Civil War until the adoption of the 
Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which is contended 
herein was never adopted. 

The foes of the South and the radical element of the nation 
just after the Civil War undertook to grant the right to vote 
to the pegro in order to increase the voting power of the 
Republican Party, and so wishing, set about by first passing a 
resolution in Congress and Senate to disallow Representatives 
from eleven states of the Union to sit in Congress and Senate 
and placing such states under military control. The resolution 
is as follows: 


8 


“Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate con¬ 
curring) that, in order to close agitation upon a question which 
seems likely to disturb the action of the Government, as well 
as to quiet the uncertainty which is agitating the minds of the 
people of the eleven states which have been declared to be in 
insurrection: No Senator or Representative shall be admitted 
into either branch of Congress from any of said states until 
Congress shall have declared said states entitled to such repre¬ 
sentation.” Passed by the House of Representatives, February 
20, 1866. (House Journal, 1st Session, 39th Congress, pages 10 
to 13) and by the Senate March 2, 1866) Senate Journal, 1st 
Session, 29th Congress, pages 198 and 199). 

As a result thereof, eighteen seats were vacant in the Senate, 
a body of seventy-four, and forty-two seats were vacant in the 
House of Representatives, a body of two hundred and forty. 
Immediately thereafter, while these Southern states were under 
military control and were not represented in Congress or Senate, 
House Joint Resolution 127, which culminated in the alleged 
Fourteenth Amendment was introduced in the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives, April 30, 1866, and passed May 10, 1866 (House 
Journal, 1st Session, 39th Congress, page 686), by a vote of 
one hundred and twenty-eight yeas and thirty-seven nays, with 
eighteen not voting. It also passed the Senate, June 8, 1866, by 
a vote of thirty-three yeas and eleven nays (Senate Journal, 
1st Session, 39th Congress, page 504). 

Notwithstanding Article V. of the original Constitution, which 
is as follows: 

“The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both Houses shall 
deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitu¬ 
tion, or, on application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of the 
several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, 
which, in either case, shall be valid, to all intents and purposes 
as a part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures 


9 


of three-fourths of the several states, or by conventious in 
three-fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratifica¬ 
tion may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amend¬ 
ment which may be made prior to the year 1808 shall in any 
manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section 
of the first article; and that no state without its consent shall 
be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.” 

The author wishes here to point out several points of argu¬ 
ment relative to the proposal to amend the Constitution. 

1. “Whenever two-thirds of both Houses shall deem it neces¬ 
sary, shall PROPOSE amendments to this Constitution, etc., 
etc.” So recites the original Constitution as to how it can 
be amended and further reciting Article V., “NO STATE 
WITHOUT ITS CONSENT SHALL BE DEPRIVED OF 
ITS EQUAL SUFFRAGE IN THE SENATE.” Now with 
the original Constitution itself as a measure, was the Fourteenth 
Amendment properly proposed or passed? Could it have been 
with eighteen seats vacant in the Senate and forty-two seats 
vacant in the House of Representatives against the consent of 
each affected state? No, it could not have been legally pro¬ 
posed or passed, and it was not legally proposed or passed, and 
has never been legally adopted, but is standing to-day a fraud 
on America and an injustice to all the South. 

2. What is the meaning of the word “two-thirds,” occurring 
in Article V. of the Constitution? How could it be proposed 
and passed by two-thirds of the Congress when no Southern 
states were represented therein? Two-thirds of the House of 
Representatives was one hundred and sixty and two-thirds of 
the Senate was forty-eight, and it was proposed and passed by 
a vote of one hundred and twenty-eight in the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives and thirty-three in the Senate. Therefore, it wasn’t 
two-thirds of either House, thus it is of illegitimate birth. 


10 


Now we have learned under what circumstances the Four¬ 
teenth Amendment had its origin and before going further with 
the history of its alleged adoption, I will recite the Fourteenth 
Amendment as it stands on record. 

Chapter IV- 

Fourteenth Amendment 

“Article XIV. Sec. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the 
United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens 
of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No 
State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the 
privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor 
shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property 
without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its 
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. 

“Sec. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the 
several States according to their respective numbers, counting 
the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians 
not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the 
choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the 
United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and 
judicial officers of the State, or the members of the Legislature 
thereof, is denied to any male inhabitants of such States being 
twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or 
in any way abridged, except for participation in the Rebellion 
or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be re¬ 
duced in the proportion which the number of male citizens 
shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years 
of age in such State. 

“Sec. 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in 
Congress, or elector or President or Vice-President, or hold 
any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under 


11 


any State, who, having previously taken oath as a member of 
Congress or as an officer of the United States, or as a member 
of any State Legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer 
of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, 
shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, 
or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress 
may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such dis¬ 
ability. 

“Sec. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States 
authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of 
pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection 
or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United 
States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obliga¬ 
tion incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the 
United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any 
slave; but all such debts, obligations, and claims shall be held 
illegal and void. 

“Sec. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by ap¬ 
propriate legislation, the provisions of this Article.” 

The Fourteenth Amendment purports to do the following: 

Section 1 contains four separate propositions: 

a. Defines citizenship in the United States. 

b. Inhibits states from making or enforcing laws abriging 
the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States. 

c. Inhibits states from depriving any person of life, liberty 
or property without due process of law (already engrafted in 
the Constitution by the Fifth Amendment). 

d. Inhibits states from denying any person within their 
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. 

Section 2 contains two separate propositions: 

a. Defines qualifications of Representatives already provided 
for without substantial difference in clause 3 of Section 2 of 
Article 1. 


12 


b. Provides reduced representation in the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives when the right to vote is denied to citizens of the 
United States. 

Section 3 contains two propositions: 

a. Prescribed ineligibility of persons to hold certain offices, 
to engage in insurrection. 

b. Prescribes removal of this ability by Congress. 

Section 4 contains two separate propositions: 

a. Validity of public debt shall not be questioned. 

b. Debts, etc., incurred in aid of insurrection, etc., are held 
illegal and void. 

Section 5 empowers Congress to enforce the amendment by 
appropriate legislation. 

The writer here wishes to invite the reader’s attention to the 
fact that the Fourteenth Amendment is the only amendment 
to the Constitution that contains so many separate and distinct 
propositions and that is couched in such ambiguous phraseology. 

Before going further with the Fourteenth Amendment, let us 
here examine the five acts of Congress known as the Reconstruc¬ 
tion Acts, which operated to secure six principal results, namely: 

1. They declared insurrection to exist in eleven Southern 
states. 

2. They deprived these states of representation in both 
Houses of Congress. 

3. They suspended the civil functions and governments of 
those states. 

4. They transformed these states into five military districts. 

5. They defranchised citizens of these states theretofore 
competent to vote at state and national elections. 

6. They enfranchised the former slaves liberated by the 
Thirteenth Amendment and transformed them into full citizens 


13 


with power to act on the proposed Fourteenth Amendment and 
other legislation in the state legislatures. 

Having recited the alleged Fourteenth Amendment and enu¬ 
merated what it purports to do and having specifically con¬ 
demned the reconstruction acts of Congress, let us now follow 
the procedure had in the alleged adoption of the Fourteenth 
Amendment. 

Chapter V. 

Procedure to Adopt the Fourteenth Amendment 

Having thus far succeeded in their vicious efforts to gain 
power for the Republican Party, the foes of the South set about 
to compel the states to adopt the Fourteenth Amendment, and 
their foul method is clearly shown in House Resolution 1058, 
2nd Session, 40th Congress, page 843, passed June 12, 1866, 
wherein Congress agrees to admit the states of North Carolina, 
South Carolina, Louisiana, Georgia and Alabama to representa¬ 
tion in Congress upon the specific condition that they ratify the 
Fourteenth Amendment. The same resolution passed the Senate, 
June 25, 1866 (2nd Session, 40th Congress, page 543), disre¬ 
garding the veto of the President of the United States. Thus 
it will be observed that the Southern states did not ratify the 
Fourteenth Amendment, but to the contrary, they rejected it, 
but a body of negroes and ruffians, known in the South as 
carpetbaggers, alleged themselves to be a legislative body, pur¬ 
ported to have ratified the Amendment. 

The following table shows the record of the alleged adoption 
of the Fourteenth Amendment and the action of each state 
respectively: 

The Legislature of Connecticut ratified the Amendment, June 
30, 1866. 

The Legislature of New Hampshire ratified the Amendment, 
July 7, 1866. 

The Legislature of Tennessee ratified the Amendment, Julv 
19, 1866. 

14 


The Legislature of New Jer^fc^tatified the Amendment, Sep¬ 
tember 11, 1866; and the Legislature of the same State passed 
a resolution in April, 1868, to withdraw its consent to it. 

The Legislature of Oregon ratified the Amendment, Septem¬ 
ber 19, 1866; and the Legislature of the same State passed a 
resolution, October, 1868, to withdraw- its consent to it. 

The Legislature of Texas rejected the Amendment, November 
1, 1866. 

The Legislature of Vermont ratified the Amendment on or 
previous to November 9, 1866. 

The Legislature of Georgia rejected the Amendment, Novem¬ 
ber 13, 1866; and the Legislature of the same State ratified it 
July 21, 1868. 

The Legislature of North Carolina rejected it, December 4, 
1866; and the Legislature of the same State ratified it July 4, 
1868. 

The Legislature of South Carolina rejected it, December 20, 
1866; and the Legislature of the same State ratified it, July 9, 
1868. 

The Legislature of Virginia rejected it, January 9, 1867. 

The Legislature of Kentucky rejected it, January 10, 1867. 

The Legislature of New York ratified it, January 9, 1867. 

The Legislature of Ohio ratified it, January 11, 1867; and the 
Legislature of the same State passed a resolution in January, 
1868, to withdraw its consent to it. 

The Legislature of Illinois ratified it, January 15, 1867. 

The Legislature of Kansas ratified it, January 18, 1867. 

The Legislature of Maine ratified it, January 19, 1867. 

The Legislature of Nevada ratified it, January 22, 1867. 

The Legislature of Missouri ratified it on or previous to 
January 26, 1867. 

The Legislature of Indiana ratified it, January 29, 1867. 

The Legislature of Minnesota ratified it, February 1, 1867. 

The Legislature of Rhode Island ratified it, February 7, 1867. 

The Legislature of Delaware rejected it, February 7, 1867. 

The Legislature of Pennsylvania ratified it, February 13, 1867. 

The Legislature of Michigan ratified it, February 15, 1867. 

The Legislature of Massachusetts ratified it, March 20, 1867. 

The Legislature of Maryland rejected it, March 23, 1867. 

The Legislature of Nebraska ratified it, June 15, 1867. 

The Legislature of Iowa ratified it, April 3, 1868. 

The Legislature of Arkansas ratified it, April 6 1868. 



15 


The Legislature of Florida ratified it, June 9, 1868. 

The Legislature of Louisiana ratified it, July 9, 1868. 

The Legislature of Alabama ratified it, July 13, 1868. 

At this point it will be observed that there being thirty-seven 
states in the Union, twenty-eight states would be the required 
number to legally ratify the Amendment to make it a part of 
the Constitution. 

The following is a letter from the President to the Senate 
relative to the Fourteenth Amendment: 

‘‘July 14,1868. 

“To the Senate of the United States: 

I transmit to the Senate a report from the Secretary of 
State enclosing a list of the States of the Union whose 
legislatures have ratified the proposed Fourteenth Article 
of amendment to the Constitution of the United States; 
and also a copy of resolutions of ratification as called for in 
the Senate resolutions of the 9th instant, together with a 
copy of the respective resolutions of the legislatures of Ohio 
and New Jersey, purporting to rescind the resolutions of 
ratification of said amendment, which had previously been 
adopted by the legislatures of these two States, respec¬ 
tively, or to withdraw their consent to the same. 

Andrew Johnson." 

The above quoted letter together with the declaration of the 
Secretary of State, portrays the fact most clearly that the 
Fourteenth Amendment was not legally ratified by sufficient 
number of states to make it a part of the Constitution. Thus 
your writer will quote the declaration of the Secretary of 
State: 

“William H. Seward, 

Secretary of State of the United States. 

To all to whom these presents come, greetings: 

WHEREAS the Congress of the United States on or about 
the 16th of June, in the year 1866, passed a resolution which 
is in the words and figures following, to-wit: 

16 


‘Joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Consti¬ 
tution of the United States. 

‘Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representa¬ 
tives of the United States of America in Congress As¬ 
sembled (two-thirds of both Houses concurring), That the 
following article be proposed to the legislatures of the 
several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States, which, when ratified by three-fourths of the 
said legislatures, shall be valid as part of the Constitution, 
namely: 

‘ARTICLE XIV.’ 

AND WHEREAS by the second section of the act of 
Congress approved the 20th of April, 1818, entitled, “An 
act to provide for the publication of the laws of the United 
States, and for other purposes,” it is made the duty of the 
Secretary of State forthwith to cause any amendment to 
the Constitution of the United States which has been adopted 
according to the provisions of the said Constitution to be 
published in the newspapers authorized to promulgate the 
laws, with his certificate, specifying the States by which 
the same may have been adopted and that the same has 
become valid to all intents and purposes as a part of the 
Constitution of the United States; and 

WHEREAS neither the act just quoted from nor any 
other law expressly or by conclusive implication, authorizes 
the Secretary of State to determine and decide doubtful 
questions as to the authenticity of the organization of State 
legislatures or as to the power of any State legislature to 
recall a previous act or resolution of ratification of any 
amendment proposed to the Constitution; and 

WHEREAS it appears from official documents on file in 
this Department that the amendment to the Constitution of 
the United States proposed as aforesaid has been ratified 
by the legislatures of the States of Connecticut, New 
Hampshire, Tennessee, New Jersey, Oregon, Vermont, New 
York, Ohio, Illinois, West Virginia, Kansas, Maine, Nevada, 
Missouri Indiana, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, 
Pennsylvania, Michigan, Massachusetts, Nebraska, and 
Iowa, and 


WHEREAS it further appears from documents on file 
in this Department that the amendment to the Constitu¬ 
tion of the States proposed aforesaid has also been ratified 
by newly constituted and newly established bodies avowing 
themselves to be and acting as the legislatures, respectively, 
of the States of Arkansas, Florida, North Carolina, Louisi¬ 
ana, South Carolina, and Alabama; and 

WHEREAS it further appears from official documents on 
file in this Department that the legislatures of two of the 
States first above enumerated, to-wit: Ohio and New Jersey, 
have since passed resolutions, respectively, withdrawing the 
consent of each of said States to the aforesaid amendment; 
and 

WHEREAS it was deemed a matter of doubt and un¬ 
certainty whether such resolutions are not irregular, in¬ 
valid, and therefore ineffectual for withdrawing the con¬ 
sent of the said two States, or of either of them, to the 
aforesaid amendment; and 

WHEREAS the whole number of States in the United 
States is thirty-seven, * to-wit. New Hampshire, Massachu¬ 
setts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, 
Pennsylvania Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Caro¬ 
lina, South Carolina, Georgia, Vermont, Kentucky, Ten¬ 
nessee, Ohio, Louisiana, Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, Ala¬ 
bama, Maine, Missouri, Arkansas, Michigan, Florida, Texas, 
Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, California, Oregon, Kansas, 
West Virginia, Nevada and Nebraska; and 

WHEREAS the twenty-three States first hereinbefore 
named, whose legislatures have ratified the said proposed 
amendment, and the six States next thereafter named as 
having ratified the said proposed amendment by newly 
constituted and established bodies, together constitute three- 
fourths of the whole number of States in the United Sates; 

Now, therefore, be it known that I, William H. Seward, 
Secretary of State of the United States, by virtue and in 
pursuance of the second section of the Act of Congress 
approved the 20th of April, 1818, hereinbefore recited, do 
hereby certify that if the resolutions of the legislatures of 
Ohio and New Jersey ratifying the aforesaid amendment 


18 


are to be deemed so remaining of full force and effect, 
notwithstanding the subsequent resolutions of the legisla¬ 
tures of those States, which purport to withdraw the con¬ 
sent of said States from such ratification, then the afore¬ 
said amendment has been ratified in the manner herein¬ 
before mentioned, and so has become valid to all intents 
and purposes as a part of the Constitution of the United 
States. 

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and 
caused the seal of the Department of State to be affixed. 

Done at the City of Washington, this 20th day of July, 
in the year of our Lord, 1868, and of the independence of 
the United States of America, the ninety-third. 

William H. Seward, 

Secretary of State. 

(Seal) 

Page 783, Documentary History of the Constitution of 
the United States. 

From original sources, Bureau of Rolls and Library, 
Volume 2.” 

But the foes of the South, wholly disregarding the fact that 
the Fourteenth Amendment had been so manifestly rejected, 
were still determined to remove all obstacles that might obstruct 
their tyrannical pathway, whereupon they passed the following 
resolution: 

“WHEREAS the Legislatures of the States of Connecti¬ 
cut, Tennessee, New Jersey, Oregon, Vermont, West Vir¬ 
ginia, Kansas, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Minnesota, 
New York, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Mich¬ 
igan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Nebraska, 
Maine, Iowa, Arkansas, Florida, North Carolina, Alabama, 
South Carolina and Louisiana, being three-fourths and more 
of the several States of the Union, have ratified the Four¬ 
teenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States 
duly proposed by two-thirds of each House of the Thirty- 
ninth Congress; Therefore, 

‘RESOLVED BY THE SENATE (the House concur¬ 
ring), That said Fourteenth Article is hereby declared to 


19 


be a part of the Constitution of the United States and it 
shall be duly promulgated by the Secretary as such. 

‘ORDERED, That the Secretary request the concurrence 
of the House of Representatives in said resolution.’ ” 


And the House of Representatives concurred with the Senate 
to the above resolution in the following words and form: 

“July 21,1868. 

“RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives concur 
in the foregoing concurrent Resolution of the Senate ‘de¬ 
claring the ratification of the Fourteenth Article of amend¬ 
ment of the Constitution of the United States.’ 

Edward McPherson, Clerk ” 

Thereupon, having been so ordered, the Secretary of State 
declared the Fourteenth Amendment a part of the Constitution. 

The author wishes to call the reader’s attention to the resolu¬ 
tion passed by Congress, declaring the Fourteenth Amendment 
legally adopted. What gave Congress the power to declare an 
amendment to the Constitution adopted? Their resolution had 
no effect whatsoever on the Amendment, and it was not and is 
not within the power of Congress to say when an amendment 
to the Constitution is or is not adopted and a part of the 
Constitution. Nevertheless, that is how the Fourteenth Amend¬ 
ment was declared valid. Let us further examine the record 
and see if twenty-eight states ratified the Fourteenth Amend¬ 
ment. 

Chapter VI. 


The Withdrawal of Consent by Three States 


The following states had ratified the Amendment when 
Secretary of State Seward issued his Declaration: 


Connecticut 
New Hampshire 
Tennessee 
New Jersey 


Oregon 
Vermont 
New York 
Ohio 


Illinois 

West Virginia 

Kansas 

Maine 


20 


Nevada Rhode Island Massachusetts 

Missouri Wisconsin Nebraska 

Indiana Pennsylvania Iowa 

Minnesota Michigan 

And also the following states, who were under military control 
and had no legally constituted legislative bodies, had ratified 
the Amendment, this they were by the terms of their restora¬ 
tion to the Union forced to do: 

Arkansas North Carolina South Carolina 

Florida Louisiana Alabama 

Out of this number (being both lists as above quoted) nine 
states acted both ways on the question: 

Alabama Florida North Carolina 

Arkansas Louisiana South Carolina 

first rejected the Amendment, but later ratified it, that is the 
bodies that purported to be the legal legislative bodies of each 
of these states are alleged to have ratified it. But it will be 
remembered that the legislative bodies of these states were not 
Constitutionally organized, all of them being under military 
control at the time and none of their white citizens allowed 
to vote in any state or national election. Thus the members 
of these alleged legislative bodies consisted of persons chosen 
under the terms of the Reconstruction Acts and, in a great 
number of cases, negroes were holding high offices. Thus any 
acts passed by such bodies would be and are null and void, un¬ 
constitutional and of no effect. 

But out of the states hereinbefore named as having ratified 
the Amendment the states of 

New Jersey Ohio Oregon 

rescinded their ratification before the Amendment was declared 
by the Secretary of State to be a part of the Constitution. 

No further proof of fraud is needed to be used than to quote 
the resolution of the State of New Jersey in its act rescinding 


21 



its ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, which is for the 
benefit of the reader herein submitted: 

“Laws of New Jersey, 1866; pp. 1113, 1114. 

JOINT RESOLUTION NUMBER IV. 

“Withdrawing the consent of this State to the proposed 
Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, en¬ 
titled Article Fourteen, and rescinding the joint resolution, 
approved September eleventh, anno domini eighteen hundred 
and sixty-eight, whereby it was resolved that said proposed 
Amendment was ratified by the legislature of this State. 

“The Legislature of the State of New Jersey having 
seriously and deliberately considered the present situation 
of the United States, do declare and make known: That 
the basis of all government is the consent of the governed, 
and all constitutions are contracts between the parties bound 
thereby; that until any proposition to alter the fundamental 
law, to which all the States have consented, has been ratified 
by such number of the States as by the Federal Constitu¬ 
tion makes it binding upon all, anyone that has assented is 
at liberty to withdraw that assent, and it becomes its duty 
to do so, when, upon mature consideration, such with¬ 
drawal seems to be necessary to the safety and happiness 
of all; prudence dictates that a consent once given should 
riot be recalled for light and transient causes; but the right 
is a natural right, the exercise of which is accompanied 
with no injustice to any of the parties; it has, therefore, 
been universally recognized as inhering in every party, and 
has ever been left unimpaired by any positive regulation. 

“The proposed amendment not having yet received the 
assent of the three-fourths of the States, which is necessary 
to make it valid, the natural and constitutional right of this 
State to withdraw its assent is undeniable. With these im¬ 
pressions, and with a solemn appeal to the Searcher of all 
Hearts for the rectitude of our intentions, and under the 
conviction that the origin and objects of said proposed 
amendment were unseemly and unjust, and that the neces¬ 
sary results of its adoption must be the disturbance of the 
harmony, if not the destruction, of our system of self- 
government, and that it is our duty to ourselves and our 
sister States to expose the same, do further declare: 


22 


“That it being necessary by the Constitution that every 
amendment to the same should be proposed by two-thirds 
of both Houses of Congress, the authors of said proposition, 
for the purpose of securing the assent of the requisite 
majority, determined to, and did, exclude from the said 
two houses eighty representatives from eleven States of the 
Union, upon the pretense that there were no such States in 
the Union; but finding that two-thirds of the remainder of 
the said Houses could not be brought to assent to the said 
proposition, they deliberately formed and carried out the 
design of mutilating the integrity of the United States 
Senate, and without pretext or justification, other than the 
possession of the power, without the rights, and in palpable 
violation of the Constitution, ejected a member of their own 
body, representing this State, and thus practically denied to 
New Jersey its equal suffrage in the Senate, and thereby 
nominally secured the vote of two-thirds of the said Houses. 

“The object of dismembering the highest representative 
assembly in the nation and humiliating a State of the 
Union, faithful at all times to all its obligations, and the 
object of said amendment were one: to place new and un¬ 
heard-of powers in the hands of a faction, that it might 
absorb to itself all the executive, judicial and legislative 
power necessary to secure for itself immunity for the un¬ 
constitutional acts it had already committed, and those it 
has since inflicted on a too patient people. 

“The subsequent usurpations of these once national as¬ 
semblies, in passing pretended laws for the establishment in 
ten States of martial law, which is nothing but the will 
of the military commander, and therefore inconsistent with 
the very nature of all law, for the purpose of reducing to 
slavery men of their own race in those States, or compelling 
them contrary to their own convictions, to exercise the 
elective franchise in obedience to the dictation of a faction 
in those assemblies; the attempt to commit to one man, 
arbitrary and uncontrollable power, which they have found 
necessary to exercise to force the people of those States, 
into compliance with their will; the authority given to the 
Secretary of War to use the name of the President, to 
countermand the President’s orders and to certify military 
orders to be ‘by the direction of the President,’ when they 
were notoriously known to be contrary to the President’s 


23 


direction, thus keeping up the form of the Constitution to 
which the people are accustomed, but practically deposing the 
President from his office of commander-in-chief, and sup¬ 
pressing one of the great departments of the government, 
that of the executive; the attempt to withdraw from the 
supreme judicial tribunal of the nation, the jurisdiction to 
examine and decide upon the conformity of their pre¬ 
tended laws to the Constitution, which was the chief func¬ 
tion of that august tribunal, as organized by the fathers of 
the Republic; all are but amplified explanations of the 
power they hoped to acquire by the adoption of the said 
Amendment. 

“To conceal from the people the immense alterations of 
the fundamental law they intended to accomplish by the 
said Amendment, they gilded the same with propositions of 
justice drawn from the State constitutions; but like all the 
essays of unlawful power to commend its designs to popular 
favor, it is marked by the most absured and incoherent 
provisions. 

“It proposes to make it a part of the Constitution of the 
United States that naturalized citizens of the United States 
shall be citizens of the United States; as if they were not 
so without such absurd declaration. 

“It lodges with the legislative branch of the Government 
the power of pardon, which properly belongs, by our system, 
to the executives. 

“It denounces and inflicts punishment for past offenses 
by constitutional provisions, and thus would make the 
whole people of this great nation in their most solemn 
and sovereign act, guilty of violating a cardinal principle 
of American liberty: that no punishment can be inflicted 
for any offense, unless it is provided by law before the 
commission of the offense. 

“It usurps the power of punishment, which, in any co¬ 
herent system of government, belongs to the judiciary, and 
commits it to the people in their sovereign capacity. 

“It degrades the nation, by proclaiming to the world that 
no confidence can be placed in its honesty or morality. 

“It appeals to the fears of the public creditors by pub¬ 
lishing a libel on the American people, and fixing it for¬ 
ever in the national Constitution, as a stigma upon the 
present generation, that there must be constitutional guard§ 


24 


against a repudiation of the public debt; as if it were pos¬ 
sible that a people who were so corrupt as to disregard 
such an obligation would be bound by any contract, con¬ 
stitutional or otherwise. 

“It imposes new prohibitions upon the power of the State 
to pass laws, and interdicts the execution of such parts of 
the common law, as the national judiciary may esteem 
inconsistent with the vague provisions of the said amend¬ 
ment, made vague for the purpose of facilitating encroach¬ 
ments upon the lives, liberties, and property of the people. 

“It enlarges the judicial power of the United States so 
as to bring every law passed by the State, and every principle 
of the common law, relating to life, liberty, or property 
within the jurisdiction of the Federal tribunals, and charges 
these tribunals with duties, to the performance of which, 
they, from their nature and organization, and their distance 
from the people are unequal. 

“It makes a new apportionment of representation, in the 
national councils, for no other reason than thereby to secure 
to a faction a sufficient number of the votes of a servile 
and ignorant race to outweigh the intelligent voices of their 
own. 

“It sets up a standard of suffrage dependent entirely upon 
citizenship, majority, inhabitancy and manhood, and any in¬ 
terference whatever by the State, imposing any other reason¬ 
able qualifications, as time of inhabitancy, causes a reduc¬ 
tion of the State’s representation. 

“But the demand of the supporters of this Amendment in 
this State: that Congress should compel the people of New 
Jersey to adopt what is called “impartial suffrage,” makes 
it apparent that this section was intended to transfer to 
Congress the whole control of the right of suffrage in the 
State, and to deprive the State of a free representation by 
destroying the power of regulating suffrage within its own 
limits, a power which they have never been willing to sur¬ 
render to the general government, and which was reserved 
to the States as the fundamental principle on which the 
Constitution itself was constructed, the principle of self- 
government. 

“This section, as well as others of the Amendment, is 
couched in ambiguous, vague, and abscure language, the 
uniform report of those who seek to encroach upon public 


25 


liberty; strictly construed, it dispenses entirely with a House 
of Representatives, unless the State shall abrogate every 
qualification, and especially that of time of inhabitancy, 
without which the right of suffrage is worthless. 

“This Legislature, feeling confident of the support of the 
largest majority of the people that has ever given expres¬ 
sion to the public will, declare that the said proposed Amend¬ 
ment being designed to confer, or to compel the States to 
confer the sovereign right of the elective franchise upon a 
race which has never given the slightest evidence, at any 
time, or in any quarter of the globe, of its capacity for 
self-government, and erect an impracticable standard of 
suffrage, which will render the right valueless to any por¬ 
tion of the people, was intended to overthrow the system of 
self - government under which the people of the United 
States have for eighty years enjoyed their liberties, and is 
unfit from its origin, its object and its matter to be incor¬ 
porated with the fundamental laws of a free people, there¬ 
fore, 

I. “Be it Resolved by the Senate and General Assembly 
of the State of New Jersey, That the joint resolution ap¬ 
proved September eleventh, anno domini eighteen hundred 
and sixty-six, relative to amending the Constitution of the 
United States, which is in the following words, to-wit: 

‘Joint Resolution ratifying the Amendment of the Con¬ 
stitution of the United States. 

I. Be it Resolved by the Senate and General Assembly 
of the State of New Jersey, That the Amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States proposed at the first 
session of the Thirty-ninth Congress, by a resolution of the 
Senate and House of Representatives of the United States 
of America in Congress assembled, to the several State 
legislatures, be, and the same is hereby ratified upon the 
part of this Legislature, and made a part of the Constitution 
of the United States of America, said Amendment being 
in the following words, to-wit: 


Be and the same is hereby rescinded and the consent on be¬ 
half of the State of New Jersey to ratify the proposed 
Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States, is hereby withdrawn. 


26 


‘2. “And be it Resolved, That copies of the foregoing 
preamble and resolution, certified to by the President of 
the Senate and Speaker of the General Assembly, be for¬ 
warded to the President of the United States, the Secretary 
of State of the United States, and to each of our Senators 
and Representatives in Congress, and to the Governors of 
the respective States. 

‘3. “And be it Resolved, That these resolutions shall take 
effect immediately.” 

“Passed, March 27, 1868. (Laws of New Jersey, 1868, 
pp. 1225-1231.)” 

Also the writer wishes to submit the resolution adopted by 
the State of Ohio rescinding its ratification of the Fourteenth 
Amendment: 

“AND WHEREAS, No amendment to the Constitution of 
the United States is valid until duly ratified by three-fourths 
of all the States composing the United States, and until such 
ratification is completed, any State has a right to withdraw 
her assent to any proposed amendment; 

“AND WHEREAS, Several distinct propositions are com¬ 
bined in the said proposed Amendment, several of which 
are already fully provided for in the Constitution of the 
United States, and to which no person or party objects; 
therefore be it 

Resolved by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, 
That the above recited resolution be, and the same is hereby 
rescinded, and the ratification on behalf of the State of 
Ohio, of the above recited proposed Amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States, is hereby withdrawn and 
refused. 

Resolved, That copies of the foregoing preamble and 
resolutions, certified to by the Speaker of the House of 
Representatives and the President of the Senate, be for¬ 
warded to the President of the United States, to each of 
our Senators and Representatives in Congress, and to each 
of the Governors of the respective States. 

Resolved, That the President of the United States be re¬ 
spectfully requested to cause to be forwarded to the Gov- 


27 


ernor of Ohio any and all papers on file in the executive 
department at Washington, certifying the ratification by 
the General Assembly of Ohio of said proposed Constitu¬ 
tional Amendment, and that the presiding officer of the 
United States Senate, and the Speaker of the United States 
House of Representatives be requested to return to the 
same officer any certificates that may have been filed with 
them, or either of them, on the subject of said ratification. 


John F. Follett, 

Speaker of the House of Representatives. 


January 15, A. D. 1868. 

(Laws of Ohio of 1868, p. 280.) 


J. C. Lee, 

President of the Senate. 


And also a like resolution passed by the State of Oregon 
rescinding their adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, which 
is as follows: 


“SENATE JOINT RESOLUTION No. 4 

“Rescinding Resolution passed September 19, 1866, relative 
to amending the Constitution of the United States, and 
withdrawing the assent of the State of Oregon to the pro¬ 
posed 14th Constitutional Amendment. 

“WHEREAS, On the 19th day of September, 1866, the 
following preamble and joint resolution was (were) adopted 
by the Legislative Assembly of the State of Oregon, to-wit: 

“WHEREAS, The Congress of the United States did, 
by concurrent resolution adopted at the first session of the 
Thirty-ninth Congress, propose to the legislatures of the 
several states the following Amendment to the Constitution 
of the United States, namely: 


ARTICLE XIV. 

“ ‘Therefore be it resolved by the Legislative Assembly of 
the State of Oregon, That the said Amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States be and the same is here¬ 
by ratified”; 


28 


“AND WHEREAS, No amendment to the Constitution 
of the United States is valid until duly ratified by three- 
fourths of all the States comprising the United States; 
and until such ratification is completed, any State has the 
right to withdraw its assent to any proposed amendment; 

“AND WHEREAS, Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary 
of State of the United States, on the 28th day of July, 
1868, issued a proclamation, reciting among other things 
that the said proposed Amendment was ratified by the 
Legislatures of the States of Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, 
Alabama, South Carolina, and Georgia, and that the same 
was adopted by more than three-fourths of the States of 
the United States; 

“AND WHEREAS, the newly constituted and newly es¬ 
tablished bodies avowing themselves to be and acting as 
Legislatures respectively, of the States of Arkansas, Florida, 
North Carolina, Louisiana, South Carolina, Alabama, and 
Georgia, were created by military despotism, against the will 
of the legal voters of the said States, under the recon¬ 
struction acts (so-called) of Congress, which are usurpations, 
unconstitutional, revolutionary, and void; and consequently 
the acts of such bodies can not legally ratify the said pro¬ 
posed Constitutional Amendment for the States which they 
pretend to represent, nor affect the rights of the other 
States of the Union. 

“AND WHEREAS, Also the said resolution, ratifying the 
said proposed Amendment to the Constitution of the United 
States, was adopted by the House of Representatives of the 
State of Oregon, on the 19th day of September, 1866, by 
a vote of twenty-five yeas to twenty-two nays, and passed 
by means of the votes of Thomas H. Brenty and M. M. 
McKean, who were illegally and fraudulently returned as 
members of the said House of Representatives from the 
County of Grant, by the said Brenty, then acting as County 
Clerk and canvasser of election returns for said County; 

“AND WHEREAS, On the 23rd day of September, 1866, 
the said Thomas H. Brenty and M. M. McKean were de¬ 
clared not entitled to the seats which they had usurped, and 
on the same day J. M. McCoy and G. W. Kinsley were de¬ 
clared to be duly elected members from the County of 


29 


Grant, and who, on the 29th day of September, 1866, en¬ 
tered their protest on the journals of the House of Repre¬ 
sentatives, and declared therein that, if they had not been 
excluded from the seats to which they were entitled, they 
would have voted against the resolution ratifying the said 
proposed Constitutional Amendment, and thereby defeated 
the adoption of the same; 

“AND WHEREAS, On the 6th day of October, 1866, the 
House of Representatives of this State adopted a resolution 
declaring that the action of that body in ratifying the said 
proposed Constitutional Amendment did not express the 
will of the said House as it then stood, after being purged 
of its illegal members; therefore 

“Be it Resolved by the Legislative Assembly of the State 
of Oregon, That the above recited resolution, adopted by 
the Legislative Assembly on the 19th day of September, 
1866, by fraud, be and the same is hereby rescinded, and the 
ratification on behalf of the State of Oregon of the above 
recited proposed Amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States, is hereby withdrawn and refused. 

“Resolved, That any amendment to the Constitution of 
the United States on the subject of representation should 
be proposed by a Congress in which all the States are repre¬ 
sented, or by a convention of all the States, where each 
could be heard in the proposing as well as in the subsequent 
ratification of such amendment. 

“Resolved, That the Secretary of State be directed to 
forward certified copies of the foregoing preamble and 
resolutions, without delay, to the President of the United 
States, to the Secretary of State of the United States, to the 
President of the Senate, and to the Speaker of the House of 
Representatives of the United States. 

“Adopted by the House, October 15, 1868. 


John Whitaker, 

Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
“Adopted by the Senate, October 16, 1868. 


(Laws of Oregon, 1868, p. 111.) 


B. F. Burd, 

President of the Senate. 


30 


It is clearly shown in these respective resolutions 
whole Amendment is a fraud and that it was founded 
evil purpose and was never constitutionally adopted. But not¬ 
withstanding the above resolutions, Congress ignored them en¬ 
tirely and declared that a state could not withdraw its ratifica¬ 
tion, but could withdraw its rejection. That is to say, it was well 
enough and all right for six states to withdraw their rejection 
and, by resolution, ratify the Amendment, but no states could 
change after ratification and by resolution reject the Amend¬ 
ment, which doctrine isn’t justice or even the shadow of justice. 
If a state can change from a negative to a positive position 
before the law is adopted, it can certainly conduct itself vice 
versa. If it can’t, then we have no such thing as justice in 
America and may as well destroy our prisons and courts, for 
this doctine is the doctrine that “Might is right,” which pre¬ 
vailed at that time. 

And at this point, we find, without the ratification of New 
Jersey, Ohio and Oregon we lack sufficient number of states to 
adopt the Amendment. Therefore, it could not, and was not, 
legally or constitutionally adopted, but is by the quoted doctrine 
of “Might is right,” in our Constitution to-day, and has been 
there, unmolested, these three score years. 

As a result of the Fourteenth Amendment, both Houses of 
Congress were filled with ^groes from Southern states.i At 
one time, the temporary President of the Senate was a $egro, 
and some of the state legislatures consisted of practically all 
fl^egroes, and in one state there was a Ajegro Governor. Thus 
it was that chaos befel the South, and had it not been for the 
unfaltering bravery and undying heroism of the noble men of 
the South who formed themselves into secret organizations and 
took the law in their own hands and wrestled it from the grip 
of tyrants, there would be no Southland to-day. The old Ku 
Klux Klan and their affiliated organizations of the days im¬ 
mediately following the Civil War were founded by America’s 


31 


LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 


020 000 292 1 


.nen. The whole South stan 
vi there should be to their memory 
sive monument to teach our children 
that the peace and liberty of their beloved Southland was pur¬ 
chased by the blood of these brave clansmen. 

But lest we should digress our thoughts too long on the past 
and forget the present, let us review the issues herein treated. 
1. The fiiegro could not vote or hold public office until the 


alleged enactment of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

2. The alleged Fourteenth Amendment was not legally pro¬ 
posed and passed by the necessary two-thirds of both Houses 
of Congress. 

3. The Southern states were placed under military control 
and their citizens defranchised and for, their state legislatures 
were substituted a body of tyrants and Negroes, who are alleged 
to have ratified the Fourteenth Amendment. 

4. The wishes of three states in rescinding their ratification 
were by Congress completely ignored. 

5. Congress, in its zealousness to force ratification, passed 
a resolution declaring the Fourteenth Amendment adopted which 
is an unprecedented, unauthorized and unconstitutional, and 
void act. 

And in conclusion, permit the author to say that the Fifteenth 
Amendment is subject to practically the same criticism as the 
Fourteenth, and has never been legally adopted, although it, 
with its illegitimate sister, the Fourteenth Amendment, stands 
to-day on our records purporting to be a part of that sacred 
document known as our Constitution. 

So, my kind reader, whether or not your author be im¬ 
prisoned by some f /\egro-loving official for publishing this book, 
or meet his death at the hands of some^pgro mob, he is glad 
to have been able to have served you in giving you the informa¬ 
tion contained herein, and he prevails in the hope that this little 
book may in some small way render a service to his beloved 
Southland and its people. 


/ 


•' * * . 


HENRY EDWIN BOLTE. 





























